Appeal of Popular Beliefs
When something is popularly believed, it is often taken to be true. Billions of people believe in God, superstitions, rituals or pseudoscience just because these beliefs are widely popular. Their argument is like this.
- If most people believe something, it must be true.
- Most people believe in the existence of God.
- Hence, God must exist.
The logic in this argument is correct, but the premise is wrong. A lie does not become a truth just because most people believe it. In the words of American author Booker T. Washington, “A lie doesn’t become truth, wrong doesn’t become right, and evil doesn’t become good, just because it’s accepted by a majority.”
A few centuries ago, most people believed that the sun revolves around the earth, which was untrue. However, today, hardly an educated person would believe it to be true. Similarly, a few centuries ago, most people believed that God sent the plague or similar life-threatening diseases to punish the people for their sins. However, after medical science had correctly identified the causes of the plague and similar diseases, it virtually eliminated them. Hence, hardly any rational person today would believe that God sends plagues to punish sinners. Truth remains a truth even if no one believes it. It is so because truth represents the objective reality, which does not rely on the perception of the subject.
It is a fact that no one can deliberately believe a lie. If people seem to believe in a lie, it is because they are not aware of the truth. Hence, the argument to support the majority view goes like this.
- Humans can believe only the truth.
- The existence of God is believed by most people.
- Hence, the existence of God must be most probably true.
Therefore, if most people in the world believe in God, we must have a good reason for it. After all, we believe in scientific theories like the law of gravity, the heliocentric theory of the solar system, and the carcinogenic nature of smoking without verifying the truth ourselves, and accept them because most people believe in them.
However, when something is most probably true, it does not mean it is completely true. Hence, it is not denied that most of the things, we believe to be true as indeed true, but not everything. Almost a billion people around the world don’t believe in God, and hence there must be some reason for it. Since, everything that most people believe is not true, we must find out ourseselves, if the claim is true or not?
How to know if a popular belief is true?
The first test of truth is that truth is one. It means like reality, it can’t change with time, place, culture and traditions. When the truth of different people is not the same, it can’t be the same. In the case of God, each religion has a different concept of God and even the commands of God are contradictory to each other.
Secondly, there must be some evidence and a proper justification to accept something as true. So, what is the evidence of God? If the same question is asked about gravity, one can demonstrate it by dropping an article which shall fall towards the ground with a fixed acceleration, which can be measured and the law of gravity can be established. Similarly is the case of establishing smoking causes cancer. In the same way, the existence of God, or a claim considered a superstition, too can be accepted as true, if proper evidence or justification is provided to support it. Since none exist, a rational person can’t accept the existence of God or anything else just because of popular belief.
Thirdly, we must find out if the issue deals with emotions. Some issues like religion, mythologies, nationalism, and history are emotional as they are connected with our identity. They are specially tailored to make the people happy and satisfied. Hence, in almost every country, people are not allowed to question or challenge them. These issues become so sacred that they can’t be challenged. In some countries, questioning religion can even be punishable by death. Likewise, you are expected to be loyal to your nation irrespective of what leadership does.
We form our opinions based on the information known to us. If all the contrary information is suppressed or condemned by the majority of the people, the contrary opinion can’t arise to find flaws in the existing beliefs. Moreover, humans are social animals, and they can’t live alone. When the cost of speaking against the majority opinion is very high, many people won’t dare to speak the truth due to fear of retaliation by the believers. As a result, we don’t hear the arguments against the existence of God and know only one side of the story, and we accept the popular belief even if it is not true. As a result, most people continue to believe in the existing ideas, whether or not they are true.
However, when people are free to give their opinion without the fear of facing the consequences, the untruth is challenged, and the people gradually lose their trust in the idea, which gradually peters off and becomes obsolete. Many countries like China, Finland, France, and New Zealand today have significant populations of atheists who don’t follow a religion or believe in God.
Suppose you live in a country where almost everyone believes in God. In that case, it can be dangerous to question the existence of God as you may face social ostracisation, be charged with heresy, and even be punished to death by the state or killed by some fanatic. So, you don’t have to fear God (who does not exist), but you have to fear the belief in God because belief (in God) exists in the minds of billions of people, which can motivate people to harm you for hurting their sentiments. In the words of Stephen Hawking, “I don’t fear God – I fear His believers.”
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